


Lost Time

by dCryptid



Category: Rick and Morty
Genre: Pre-Canon, feels kinda
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-19
Updated: 2015-09-19
Packaged: 2018-04-21 14:08:13
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,196
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4831976
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dCryptid/pseuds/dCryptid
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“Beth, I know I’m not always the best dad, and...well, that’s not awesome. But you’re a good kid. And when you grow up, and have kids of your own, I know you’ll be a way better parent than I ever was.”</p>
            </blockquote>





	Lost Time

**Author's Note:**

> I'm obsessed with Rick and Morty and also like making people have emotions. deal w/it.

            “Daddy?”

            Rick uncurled his spine with a groan, rubbing a hand over his face. The other held the device on the workbench in front of him steady - wouldn’t do to have it wobbling around too much, not at this stage in development.

            He heard the door handle rattling. “Daddy?”

            How long had he been out here? It couldn’t have been _that_ long - he’d told her to go bother her mother no more than fifteen minutes ago. An hour, max.

            “Daddy’s busy, sweetie,” he yelled, tone not quite matching the words.

            Something clicked behind him, and the door swung open with a creak. _Note to self - oil workshop door hinges._ And how had she managed to unlock the door in the first place? It was just a regular keyhole lock, sure, but the only key was in his pocket. _Addendum - upgrade door locks._

            “But I need your help,” Beth said, her small voice firm and unwavering.

            Rick quickly shored up his project with scraps, tools, and parts of other devices so that it wouldn’t move when he let it go. He spun on the seat of his stool to face his daughter, who was standing in the doorway with a nervous but determined look on her face.

            He sighed. “With what?”

            “My homework.”

            “Didn’t I tell you to go ask your mother for help?”

            “That was _yesterday’s_ homework,” Beth replied, and he could see the frustration on her tiny face.

            Oh. Oh shit.

            “Right. Uh.” Rick rubbed his face again, digging his knuckles into the corners of his eyes so that he didn’t have to look at his daughter.

            “And I asked Mom, but she told me to come ask _you_ because-” Beth hesitated, before doing a fair imitation of her mother’s voice- “you need to come out of the shop sometime, just so we know you’re alive.” She frowned. “And she’s thinks she’s been cutting you too much slack.”

            Rick suppressed a belch. “Yeah, she probably has been.” Now that he was aware of how much time had passed, hunger and physical fatigue were making themselves known, his shoulders stiff and stomach rumbling. Not tired, yet, but it’s not like he slept much even when he was on a more normal schedule.

            On a hunch, he checked his watch, but the time dilation feature was turned off. Welp. This was definitely in the running for “most time lost track of while doing work.”

            “Please, Daddy,” Beth said. “It’s math. I read the book over and over but I just don’t get it.”

            Rick looked at his daughter, then over his shoulder at the device on the workbench.

            “Beth,” he said, hopping off his stool and dropping to one knee on the floor, “c’mere.” Even kneeling like this he was so much taller than her - she was a petite child, and he was so damn leggy. But she came close, and he squeezed her shoulders, as comfortingly as he knew how.

            “Look,” he said, “I know sometimes things are really, really hard, and can take a long time to learn how to do. But I also know something else, something _really_ important.”

            She looked up at him, wary but curious. “What?”

            “That you’ve got your daddy’s brains,” he said. “And you’re gonna go back up to your room, and you’re gonna try to do your math problems, and you’re gonna figure it out, and you’re gonna _kick butt_ , okay?”

            Beth nodded, hesitant. Maybe implying she had his level of intelligence wasn’t the best thing he could have done - she was acutely aware of how his brains affected his life, her life. Affected their family, fragile as it was. Too late to take it back, though.

            “Do you really think I’m smart?” she asked.

            “Hell yes!” he replied, forgetting to censor himself. “Super smart. You’re gonna get an A in math, an A+, and grow up to be, I dunno, a horse doctor or something-”

            Beth frowned, and interrupted him. “But I wanna be a people doctor.”

            “Sure, whatever.”

            She still didn’t look terribly happy.

            Rick sighed, trying to think of a way to salvage the situation. She was a good kid, and while he hated to be honest - it meant being honest with _himself_ \- he was really pretty terrible at this. Too many other things on his mind, all the time, a veritable maelstrom of stuff swirling around in his head, getting in the way of things. Things like raising a child.

He bit the proverbial bullet. “Beth, I know I’m not always the best dad, and...well, that’s not awesome. But you’re a good kid. And when you grow up, and have kids of your own, I know you’ll be a way better parent than I ever was.”

            “What if I don’t _want_ kids?”

            He clapped her on the shoulders. “I don’t really think you have much choice on that front, sweetie.”

            Her face twisted in confusion, but he was already rising to his feet. “Go tell your mom I’ll be out in a little bit, okay?”

            Her nod was small. “Okay.” When she left, she shut the door behind her.

            Rick collapsed back onto his stool, spun around a few times, ran a hand through his hair. It was graying around the temples, more and more with each passing day.

            He knew about the kid, of course - Beth’s kid, her future son, the one with the stupid name, and the fact that his timeline was almost guaranteed to have one. Rick had been _out_ there, in the multiverse, and met more than a fair handful of the little squirts in the company of future alt-versions of himself. He’d immediately deduced that he hadn’t been around to stop his daughter from giving the kid such an awful moniker, although it was likely more the fault of the kid’s father, some schmuck named Jerry. _Jerry._ Rick hadn’t even met the guy and he hated him for laying hands on his daughter, especially after he’d found out when their first child, the girl, had been conceived. Must have not been around for that, either.

            Shitty dad, et cetera. Not worth worrying about that right now. He picked up his screwdriver and leveled it at the device on the table, still supported by bits of scrap metal.

He wasn’t free to wander the multiverse at whim, not yet. The really exciting places were also the most dangerous, so he was limited to a handful of safe and familiar areas - Bird Person’s pad, the Council headquarters, Blips and Chitz. Secure places, where he was relatively free of the worry that he’d be tracked down by someone wanting to take advantage of his intelligence. Only the twerp could provide a reliable shield, and the Council wouldn’t even _lend_ him one. Bureaucrats, the lot of them.

            He would just have to be patient. Beth was what, nine now? Ten? Add a decade and change for her to grow up, meet that douche _Jerry_ , have their first little accident, another ten, fifteen years for the kid to be old enough to drag around with him…

            Rick put down the screwdriver, rubbed his temples. He was terrible at being patient.

            He needed a drink.

           

**Author's Note:**

> while the existence of Tiny Rick seems to refute this, I always envisioned younger Rick as being blonde, like Beth. and even though unnamed-mom-character does not appear here, I think of her as having curly red hair - Beth's hair reads as being curly, to me, and it would explain the color of Summer's hair. Also, that whole redheads thing in the Unity episode? yeah.


End file.
